Star Wars: Infinite Empire
by Manic Oppressive
Summary: Hundreds of years after the death star's destruction, the Sith Empire and True Empire duel for control of the galaxy. But a disturbance is felt, and a new power threatens to tear the galaxy apart. Original characters, ongoing story. Chapter 2 Published.
1. Prologue: Space Junk

Credit to George Lucas for Star Wars, Timothy Zhan for good Star Wars, and any other author/game designer whose ideas I reference. KOTOR gets a special nod.

I obviously don't own any pre-existing characters, names, etc. This story is as canon as I felt like making it. If I disagree with fundamental aspects of the Cade era stories, it's just because I have no appreciation for them.

_**A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…**_

_**STAR WARS:**_

_**Infinite Empire**_

_**The hundredth year of the IMPERIAL CIVIL WAR has passed. The TRUE EMPIRE, now led by a small parliament of second and third-generation loyalists, and the SITH EMPIRE, led by the young DARTH NARANA, have fought to a standstill. The Galactic Alliance, taking advantage of the chaos, has reclaimed numerous worlds in the Outer Rim. As the three sides duel for survival, a new disturbance is felt in the force, and a new power threatens the shattered galaxy…**_

**Prologue: Space Junk**

_Twenty... Five... Thousand... Years..._

_234 ABY_

"Dropping out of hyperspace in five minutes, people. Strap in." Setting the intercom down, the captain leaned back in the cracked and faded co-pilot's seat of an old freighter. This was the last deep space run she'd lead, she intended to head back to Couruscant with what money she'd made and spend the rest of her days in the high-rise overlooking the Senate building. A simple life, and anything but a quiet life. Twenty-five years in deep space had given her more than enough quiet for one lifetime.

"Alright, folks, we're dropping hyperdrive in 3...2...1... Now." The old ship lurched with the sudden decrease in momentum, outdated inertial dampeners straining to hold it together. The streaks of white light outside the windows faded to single points of light, small and insignificant in the endless darkness around them. It was a familiar sight to the captain, but no less unsettling in its normalcy. _So much space... How can one person make a difference in a galaxy so large?_

"Cap'n? Cap'n! LENEY!" Her pilot was shouting at her. The captain decided it would probably be best not to make the crew think something was wrong. She didn't want to break the news of her departure until after they'd gotten the spoils of the day.

"Sorry, Yawa, I was just thinking. Thinking about all of this... space. Everything around us, the mass of it, and what little impact we really have." Her young pilot shrugged.

"Seems ta me it's better not thinkin' about it. Too much else ta focus on 'round 'ere." The captain sighed and pulled herself out of the chair. The kid wasn't supposed to get it yet, she still had a whole lifetime of space travel ahead of her. She picked up the old hazard gear from the floor next to her, and slipped each piece on over her jumpsuit. _So much space..._

The freighter crept toward an archaeic, lifeless vessel. Not one among the salvage crew could guess how long it had been drifting through space, doomed to fly forever. With nothing to stop it, it was moving at almost exactly the same speed it had been whenever it had set out. Today, its journey would end.

_KRRR-CHUNK. _A docking clamp emerged from the freighter and unceremoniously smashed into the side of the larger vessel. It ground to a halt, pulled back by the freighter's thrust. Once the crew managed to get both ships completely stopped, a passage-sized tube extended along the path of the clamp. As it sealed itself to the hull of the vessel, the crew began the walk across, all four of them wearing the same style of ten year old hazard suit. One of them, a tall rodian, walked a few paces ahead of the rest, ready with a cutting torch to break into the untouched ship. The rest carried preservation equipment and crates to bring the spoils of the journey back in.

"'Ey Karido, you wanna hurry it up a bit? We really don't have all day." The pilot, a young Twi'lek girl, was tapping her foot against the thin metal platform inside the tube.

"Actually, we _do_ have all day. That's kind a given, considering how long it would take for anyone else to get out here." The rodian said in a rasping, world-beaten voice.

"Nevertheless, she has a point. It's taking you an awfully long time to get through this one." The captain, too, was growing impatient. It was a day's journey back to civilized space, and she wanted to feel solid ground beneath her feet. A loud _CRACK_ informed them that the rodian had broken through the hull.

"Sorry about that. I've never seen one this thick." As the crew walked through, they understood. The exposed innards of the hull were nearly six feet thick, with most of the depth being solid metal. There was a stoic silence as they entered the eerie ship. The interior walls were pristine, as clean as the day the ship was made. The cargo bay the crew had entered showed no signs of use, not even a bit of dust. The only thing that stood out at all was a small plaque on the far wall of the hold. The captain approached it first.

"I can't read this. Anyone know what language this is?" Another human, this one a short man wearing thin eyeglasses, stepped in front of her.

"This is Rakatan." He said curtly, moving back to the rear of the group. As he walked, he added, "Old Rakatan. Can't read it."

"Rakatan? You mean, like, the Infinite Empire? The one that every bit of technology, ever, has been credited to? _They_ built this ship?" The captain eyed the rest of the empty hold with a sinking depression. "From the looks of it, they forgot to load its cargo before setting out." Indeed, upon entering the next room they found the same lack of anything interesting. Strangely, the ship seemed to have no crew quarters or facilities, just empty white cargo hold after empty white cargo hold. Before entering the final hold, the captain addressed her crew.

"Alright, it looks like we've got a bust. Once we sweep this last room, we'll gut the ship's internal components and set the charges. Everyone knows the drill, meet back on the _Foreground_ when you're done." The captain absent-mindedly opened the door in front of her, wandering inside.

A deep rumbling sound emitted from the far corner of the room. This hold, unlike the rest, was not lit with the same cold fluorescents. Only a faint blue glow radiated from the far corner. The captain switched on her flashlight and slowly stepped toward it.

"What is it?" The pilot ran her hand along the edge.

"It looks like a… stasis pod, or something." The rodian growled. He, too, pressed his hand against the cold, smooth edge.

The pod began to quiver. The pilot and the rodian leapt backward, startled, falling on the clean floor of the ship. They saw, with dread, that the pod was precariously balanced on its support, and the pressure of their hands had set it rocking. Before anyone could reprimand them, the pod fell to the floor with a great crash, spilling blue fluids all over the pristine tile. As the fluids slowly leaked toward them, they heard a faint groan from inside the pod. Whatever it was, it was awake.

The captain drew her sidearm and stepped around to the side of the pod, tilting it to get a better look inside. With a shriek, she was thrown suddenly against the wall behind her, pinned by an unseen force. The rodian rushed to aid her, but was flung backward across the room. The pod upended, flinging the remainder of the fluids within on the wall and soaking the captain. Where the pod had been, a strange creature was pushing itself to its feet.

Without further provocation, the twi'lek and the short man fired their blasters at the creature. The bolts of plasma seared through the rancid, stale air, only to fizzle into oblivion a few inches from the creature's skin. The two of them were lifted into the air, their blasters flung across the room. As they hung there, held up by an unknown aura, the creature spoke. Its voice was raspy, as though it had not been used in a very long while. The creature spoke in Basic, as though it knew that was the only language they'd all understand.

"Twenty… Five… Thousand… Years… For twenty five thousand years I've lived… Alone, frozen in an endless stasis. I have not slept… And yet now you wake me… 'What are you?' Yes… I can see. I can see inside your primitive minds… for twenty five millennia I've silently honed my great power… You, Leneva Verin, you think you're lonely. You've flown through the ink for twenty five years, and now you intend to retire, to escape the silence… _But you don't know the meaning of the word._ For all of your meagre twenty-five years, you've never been alone. Always with someone else, while I… I have had no one, for a thousand of your pathetic lifetimes! And you…" The creature turned to face the others.

"Yawa Worth. You fly with this crew for the _adventure._ Space is a terror, an abysmal, endless torment, but an adventure? And you, Relen Sal," He faced the short man, "come because no one here knows or cares how many you've killed, after brutalizing their bodies. And you," He turned finally to the rodian, pinned to the floor where he'd fallen. "You run from the violence of your home world, too cowardly to stay and fight for your family's honor. You are all pathetic. You all think you know what hardship is… I have waited for THOUSANDS OF YEARS! Doomed, to forever drift in the void for my crimes!" With this burst of anger, the bulkhead behind him crumpled. Screws flew loose, the metal plating twisted and fell to the floor. The creature stood, still, where he had been since he had awakened, now taking an ominous tone in his voice.

"For twenty-five thousand years, I have waited… conscious. Alone, with nothing to occupy my mind. And yet now… now I have only one desire. For twenty-five thousand years, I have been silenced. And I… want… to _scream._" The creature let out a blood-boiling howl, releasing thousands of years of anguish and power into the ship. The members of the crew were smashed against the crumbling metal around them, reduced to unrecognizable gore. As the ship tore itself apart, the power of the scream erupted over the galaxy. It washed over planet after planet, but went unnoticed. It enveloped Rodia, unseen. It ripped through Ryloth, unfelt. Its power swept over Dantooine, Naboo, Couruscant… And the inhabitants heard nothing. But it would be heard soon enough.

**Star Wars: Secrets of the Infinite Empire**

**By: Collin Turner**


	2. Chapter 1: A Chip in the Armor

Part One: Whetstone

Chapter One: A Chip in the Armor

"I have a bad feeling about this." A young, thin man with scraggly dark brown hair was walking blindfolded toward the center of a small military hangar. A larger man next to him was guiding him, pushing him toward the mysterious tarp-covered shape in the middle of the room.

"I swear, if you ever utter those words again I'm going to drive a stick through your skull. Now come on, we don't have all day." The guide was a tall, thickly-built man with a staff strapped across the back of his dark green jumpsuit. He had stoic face and a bit of gruffness to his voice, attributed perhaps to its under-use. The two men stopped just before reaching the veiled object that dominated the otherwise empty hangar. A woman wearing a dark grey Imperial uniform and sporting unkempt blonde hair was waiting with her hands on the tarp. At a motion from the larger man, she swept it off just as the blindfold was pulled from the young man's face.

"Happy birthday, Joseph!" The two shouted in unison. Before the young man was an old T-65 X-Wing Starfighter, but one that showed very few signs of its original manufacturing. It had strange, elongated engines in place of the stock propulsion, and was painted a burnt orange with a deep red trim. Extra blasters had been placed on the wing tips, giving the fighter a sharp, toothed appearance. Where an astromech droid normally would've been seated, there was a small rectangular sensor dish, rotating slowly with the minimal power the ship was providing. Joseph stood, speechless, admiring the utilitarian design of the ship.

"Wow… Where did you find the money for all of this, Emyrla?" The woman chuckled.

"Let's just say that our mutual friend San Raoul should not be made aware of the origin of these parts, or what really happened to his warehouse on Ouijan IV. I take it you're satisfied with your gift?" Joseph nodded, still having trouble pushing the gratitude out of his throat. Suddenly, the realization of what Emyrla had said hit him.

"Wasn't Raoul's warehouse raided by Imperials?" Emyrla laughed.

"Yeah, there are advantages to being in charge of a lot of the anti-pirate operations in this sector. I tipped off my higher-ups about the warehouse and offered to raid it. Once we had, I made a few things I wanted disappear, and voila, I get things we can use _and_ brownie points with the bosses in one swoop." Emyrla had the insignia of an Imperial Major on her uniform, one she had earned through almost a decade of advancement in the Sith Imperial Navy. In fact, all three of them had at one point served in the Empire's military, though Joseph and his larger friend, Elijah, had been marines. Unlike Emyrla, they had left the Empire several years ago, on decidedly unfriendly terms.

"Are you going to stand there with a stupid grin on your face, or are you going to give it a test run?" Emyrla pushed him to the cockpit ladder. As Joseph strapped himself in, he saw a note stuck to the tactical display.

_Button on bottom of stick releases one of four seismic charges. Please don't do this within my earshot._

He smiled and kicked the machine to high throttle. It rocketed out of the hangar, spitting a trail of flame three meters long behind it. He squeezed the dangerously light trigger, unleashing a salvo of sizzling plasma into a tree grove ahead of him. The loose controls gave the craft a weightless feel, and now more than ever, Joseph felt the euphoria of flying.

The craft was losing altitude. Joseph had stalled within moments of taking off. As Emyrla liked to remind him, he wasn't a very good pilot. He did, however, managed to stabilize the spiraling X-Wing before a potentially deadly crash could occur.

The orange machine drifted back into the hangar. The sun was setting, casting a violet and orange glow over the forests. The sun had risen shortly before Joseph had taken off, which meant around four hours had passed.

Elijah and Emyrla were nowhere to be seen as he exited the ship, but what Joseph did see sent a spike of panic through his mind. A small metal box was seated on a workbench near the east wall, humming peacefully. He recognized it immediately—it was a Sith communications jammer. He darted across the room to the bench, flipping the small switch on the side of the device. It ceased its hum, and the few lights on the top flickered out. Joseph fumbled for the com-link in his pocket and clicked it on.

"Elijah, Emyrla, can you hear me? Repeat—Elijah, Emyrla-" Emyrla cut him off.

"Yeah, we can hear you. Joseph, you have to get out of there, _now._ The Sith showed up about an hour ago. Elijah and I managed to get out along with any especially incriminating evidence, but they won't take too kindly to you leaving." Joseph's shoulders fell from their nervous tension. Now that he knew they were alright, he could focus on getting himself out of here alive.

"Emyrla, where are you?"

"We're in orbit aboard the _Back Burner._ Get up here ASAP, we need to clear out before their Strike Cruiser notices us. Emyrla out." The thumping of boots on a metal floor was very distinctive. The door a few yards from where Joseph stood slid open, and a pair of stormtroopers strolled in. They hadn't seen him yet, probably due to their horrible peripheral vision. Their armor was unmistakably Sith: red stripes adorned their charcoal grey armor, and long shoulder pads stretched almost a half-foot off their figures. As one turned, his pad smacked the other trooper's chest.

"Hey, hey! Watch it, will ya?"

"Sorry. New armor. My old gear got the shoulder spike knocked off by mortar fire, I'd gotten used to maneuvering without them." As the soldiers conversed, Joseph positioned himself behind a large barrel, checking to ensure that it contained nothing explosive. He pulled his blaster from its holster, taking only brief aim before spitting two bolts of plasma that neatly dropped the soldiers where they stood. Not the best pilot… But one hell of a marksman. Joseph sprang from his cover and sprinted to his X-Wing, skipping the start-up procedures and rocketing out of the hangar.

The _Back Burner_ was a fairly large picket ship, on par with most corvettes in terms of size. It had plenty of room for Joseph's new X-Wing, which was nestled cozily inside. Joseph, along with his two companions, were sitting in the spacious cockpit, with a touch of sour mood in the air. Emyrla had just gotten off the long-range communicator.

"I called Tyver and told him where we were rendezvousing. Still can't believe the Sith snuck up on us like that." She leaned back in her chair.

"Yeah, well, they've gotten good at that lately. I think… I think it's time to start making calls." At Joseph's words, Emyrla and Elijah sat up straight. Joseph continued.

"It's clear that the Sith aren't going to get weaker any time soon. If we wait much longer they might beat the True back and finish off the Alliance, and then our window is gone. If we assemble now and strike, we might be able to knock them off balance."

"Are any of our _con_tacts still _in_tact?" Emyrla asked.

"I've talked to Korbyn fairly recently, and I know Pytor is still safe. Even if none of the others could get their guys together, that gives us around six thousand heads, and that's plenty to start off. If the other three get in we could break twelve thousand, and we'd be off to a hell of a start. What do you say?" Elijah nodded in agreement, and Emyrla smirked.

"I'd say it's about time we take my higher-ups down a notch."


	3. Chapter 2: An Axe to Grind

Author: The first chapter, I assure you, was a low outlier in terms of length. It was the barest introduction I could make for a few of the main characters, the rest will be much longer. After this one, which isn't that much longer. Additionally, I forgot to include the date with chapter one. Chapter Two's date can be applied. Because I know someone is going to point this out, I am quite aware that a specific section of this chapter is very, very horrible in terms of grammar. Fragments abound. It's stylistic. So please, no comments about "the omGwtFBBQ horribl3 grammer" in the 'relic' section. One more thing, if you're expecting any kind of a schedule for these things, you can keep expecting. I won't guarantee any kind of reasonable time table for my postings. So, without further ado…

* * *

Chapter Two: An Axe to Grind

_253 ABY_

"What do you _mean_, they're not coming? We have a contract, damn it!" Joseph was having problems controlling his temper over the com-link. A smooth voice that seemed incapable of anything but comfort came back across.

"Pytor said he'd refund your money. Apparently he's retired. Korbyn is just reluctant to start his contract when we don't even have a base of operations—you can't deny that that's a logical reason. None of the other three think there's any especially good reason to strike the Sith now, of all times."

"Tyver, you know as well as I do there's never going to be a better time. This is the most stretched they've been in the four years since we left, but the True Empire's on the brink. We have to move _now!_"

"Joseph, I know all of this. The problem lies in convincing the mercs that now is the best time to risk their ships and crews for us. A lot of them are beginning to wonder if living under the Sith is really so bad. I'll try to come up with something, but I've got to go for now. I'm having trouble holding the hyperdrive together on this hunk of scrap. Tyver out." Joseph sat back in his seat, exasperated. He'd spent three of his four independent years trying to piece together a network of long-term mercenaries, and now it was unraveling with only the slightest strain.

Elijah stepped through the open door and sat heavily in the navigator's chair. He had just begun punching coordinates for a jump when Joseph spoke.

"The network's dead. They don't feel motivated, which means we're starting over. Take us to Silvera, I'll call up a few friends and cousins and see if we can't get a new ball rolling." Elijah nodded and erased the destination he had just set, entering the new system's route with a practiced ease. Joseph stood, feeling a bit sick to his stomach.

"I'm gonna go run a practice sim. Call me up if anything happens." He stepped out the door of the cockpit and into a turbolift, which spirited him down the tall ship to his quarters. As he stepped out, he pressed three buttons on a small control panel by the door. A simulation pod's canopy swung open, and Joseph nestled himself inside.

The all-to-familiar 'snap-_hiss_' of a lightsaber blade made the hair on the back of Joseph's neck stand straight. A brown cloaked figure approached him with a glowing yellow shaft humming away in the crisp air. Joseph dropped his right foot back into a combat stance and drew his weapon—a conventional sword, not unlike the one he often carried outside the simulation. It was reinforced with various metals that would prevent it from an easy cut by a lightsaber, and was always the weapon of choice for confronting a force-adept. According to the instructions he'd given the computer, this would be a fairly easy opponent, of similar skill to most untrained boom-adepts.

About nineteen years ago, something happened in the galaxy that no one could have predicted. An entire generation of force adepts was increased by two-hundred fold. No one could explain why, over the course of a single year, more force-sensitive children had been born than in several centuries before, but it destroyed any semblance of 'balance' the force might've had remaining. Suddenly millions of teenagers were being raised with no training to hone their force-abilities, as the already trained Jedi numbered only in the thousands. Many of these 'adepts,' as they were known, joined the True Empire, still more joined the Sith. Hundreds of thousands wandered the galaxy as mercenaries or bounty-hunters.

Regardless of their affiliation, however, the mere presence of these imbalances forced a complete change in tactics for the galaxy's wars. Soldiers could no longer exchange fire as rapidly as in wars past, because it was likely that an adept was waiting on the other side of the field to deflect the shots straight back. Almost all of these adepts used lightsabers, if only for the intimidation factors, and so soldiers had to be trained in melee combat.

It was one of these adepts that Joseph was now facing in his simulation. He had uploaded this one from his memories. Admittedly, it was one of the weaker opponents he had faced, but he simply wasn't in the mood to deal with one of the warriors who had actually posed a challenge. This one, despite having all of the cognitive abilities of his late, real-world counterpart, and all of the memories from the past simulation battles, was about to attempt the same tactic that had failed so many times before.

The yellow lightsaber flashed downward as the adept tried to slice Joseph in half vertically. Joseph flicked his sword upward and to the left, bringing the lightsaber well out of a combat-ready pose, and carried the motion of his own sword in a loop, slashing a deep gash upward through his enemy's torso. The simulation closed, completed after only four seconds. Joseph stepped out of the pod, feeling a little bit better already. It was always refreshing to remind himself of his own strengths, especially after such a barrage on his weaknesses as today.

* * *

Hundreds of light-years away, a woman was screaming. This was no ordinary woman, mind you. Fera Nieson was the sister of Darth Narana, the current leader of the Sith Empire. Fera Nieson was a powerful force-user, not one of the shallow excuses for Jedi that had come from the adept-boon. These were, of course, linked issues—Fera Nieson was being tortured to death by her sister because of her abilities.

"Now, Fera, you know as well as I that the stability of our great Empire is served best by there being only _one_ potential claimant to the throne." She released a bolt of lightning from the tips of her fingers, provoking another scream from her bound sister. Fera slowly regained her composure, pulling her head up to glare at her sister.

"Kill me then, but don't waste your time with this."

"Waste? Waste my time? My dear sister, this is the most fun I've had in as long as I can remember! I'm not _wasting_ anything, I'm _savoring_ every minute of this." Another bolt of lightning caught Fera on the chest, but this time she remained silent. Narana furrowed her bushy black eyebrows.

"Surely you're not done already! I've barely even _begun._ You can't give up this early in the fun… What would mother say?" Fera jerked her head up. Lightning shot from her eyes—figuratively, of course. The literal lightning shot from her lips and hit Narana square in the face.

"You BITCH!" Narana threw her sister's head against the wall with a quick burst of force energy, stretching and convulsing her neck in ways clearly unintended by her biology. "You've always been trying to undermine everything I do! I can never have successes of my own when you're around! I can't _wait_ to blast your lifeless body out an airlock!" Fera closed her eyes, waiting for the final blow to be struck.

"You think I'm letting you die THIS easily? No. You're staying RIGHT-" She slammed Fera's head against the wall once more for emphasis, "where you are, until I find our dear brother and bring him to see you one last time. I assure you, neither of you will be silent through what I have planned for you then." Narana released her sister's head, turning on a heel and storming out of the room as Fera hung limp from her restraints.

* * *

Narana was now in a very bad mood. Her sister had been a pain, literally, during today's torture, and she was becoming impatient with the search for her brother.

"Why does my family always have to cause me such a headache?" She grumbled to no one in particular. Her parents, of course, were long since disposed of. Her father had fallen to the war with the True Empire, her mother to matricide. Narana was a self-made orphan and, if she had her way, would soon be an only child.

"Your highness, we have a small situation that requires your attention." A nervous young Ensign was waiting at the end of the hall. The fact that he was young had little to do with his nervousness; Even the most hardened officers had learned to fear Narana's hot temper.

"If it's _small,_ why do I have to deal with it?"

"Well… ma'am… There's the issue of that pair of stormtroopers who deserted a few years ago…"

"Why do these two continue to plague us? We've had stormtroopers desert before, even from the 17th division. Why are these two so special?" Narana had reached the Ensign, and was standing over him somehow, despite being several inches shorter.

"Ma'am, the unit we sent to Kerpan failed to apprehend them. They escaped with one other comrade on-board a small blockade-runner. We believe they're heading to their home planet, a small world just outside the inner rim called Silvera, to start some sort of rebellion."

"Well, that's certainly the last thing we need. You're wanting my approval for Base Delta Zero then?" Narana said cheerily. Her day was beginning to brighten.

"What? Your majesty, I hardly think destroying an entire planet is necessary just to get two ex-stormtroopers out of our hair."

"No, but it will certainly dissuade any future deserters. Do it." The Ensign paled and looked as though he wanted to protest, but knew better. If he didn't relay the order, his successor would five minutes later—there was nothing he could do for the planet his Empress had so casually doomed.

* * *

Silvera was a small, temperate planet in the Expansion Region, nestled deep in Sith-controlled space. It was a minor merchant stop and not generally of much interest to the Empire that controlled it. It sat just off the Corellian trade spine, just close enough to keep it wealthy without making it a major hub. Its inhabitants enjoyed relative anonymity in the galaxy at large, and were blissfully immune to the ongoing wars. So when a Sith Star Destroyer appeared in orbit, it caused quite a commotion.

Joseph and Elijah were already on the surface of the planet, in its capitol, a fairly large city called Silvron. They were just out of the space port—one of Joseph's acquaintances had delayed them immediately upon landing. Both of them knew that this Sith interloper could not possibly mean well.

"Joseph, we should get out of here. They're probably here for us." Elijah glanced over his shoulder to make sure they weren't already being tailed.

"There are six million people in this city and three billion on the planet. They've got a hell of a search to find u-" A massive bolt of plasma struck a building across the city, sending shockwaves for miles. Another immediately followed, striking a building just up the street from Joseph and Elijah. It disappeared in a cloud of dust and vaporized stone. Without another word, the two of them turned and sprinted back toward the spaceport. The turbolasers of the star destroyer were pelting the city in rapid succession now, and four more ships had just exited hyperspace.

The space port was beginning to crumble from the onslaught, but the small two-man transport the pair had come in was still intact. They strapped in and tore out of the bay just before it collapsed, igniting their sublight engines despite still being in the planet's atmosphere.

"What the _hell_ are they doing?" Joseph had given the controls over to Elijah's superior flight skills, and was looking back at the burning city below. "They're… It's… No!" Joseph's words failed him as he watched his homeworld shattered by the Sith. He tried to speak again, but his voice choked in his throat. Elijah was silent, either reflecting on the chaos or focusing on getting past the Star Destroyers.

The Imperials either didn't notice or didn't care about the ships scattering from the planet. A few were caught in the turbolasers meant for the ground beneath, dotting the sky with flashing bursts of dust. Joseph took one last look at the green fields of Silvera as they were slowly splotched with black, before the stars stretched and the ship disappeared into hyperspace.

"Joseph, come in! Joseph! Are you there?" Emyrla had witnessed the destruction of Silvera, and was now frantically trying to contact her comrades. Finally, a crackling noise brought Joseph's cracking voice over the com-link.

"They… They wiped it out… Everything… Gone…" Emyrla sighed. They were alive, at least.

"Yeah, I saw. I got in contact with my superiors. There was a Base Delta Zero code on the planet… Because of you two. It was Darth Narana's overreaction at work… Joseph, I'm sorry."

"You're not one of them. You've got nothing to be sorry for. But they _will _be sorry." Joseph's voice had lost some of its strain, but seemed hard and cold. Emyrla might've reacted differently if she'd known that this change wouldn't be temporary.

* * *

Joseph and Elijah were back onboard the _Back Burner,_ along with Emyrla and two other men. Tyver Corah was tall and imposing, with a light build but a strong posture. His blonde hair was slicked to the side, and a blaster rifle hung from a holster on his back.

The other man was a force-adept, judging from the lightsaber on his hip, but would be quick to say that he was not born during the force-boom. He had been trained by an experienced knight, and had taken easily to all of the lessons except those on humility.

"Korbyn, I'm glad you could make it." Joseph had the same icy inflection in his voice, and even Korbyn noticed it, shifting uncomfortably in his seat.

"Yes, well, what the Sith did to your home… it changed things. I'm still not comfortable without having a base of any kind, but… Well, I can't just wait for Narana to destroy my home. I've recruited a lot of like-minded people in the last few days, I've got five-thousand trained soldiers ready for your command." Joseph grimaced. Without Pytor's group, their numbers would be lackluster, but they'd have to make do.

"Joseph, I've made one other contact who might be useful. Ex-mercenary captain I met on Corellia. He said he could probably get a thousand good men to join up if we paid well." Tyver voice dropped a bit on the last few words. Money was already a bleak outlook.

"That seems to be the trick, eh?" Emyrla said. "We've got jack in the way of money, and an awful lot of troops to pay. Well, I might have an idea there, but it's going to be risky for everyone involved." The others leaned in. "I can get, without raising a hair of suspicion, the cargo routes for the Sith's most expensive stuff. Kill two birds with one stone—we get the money we need, and screw the Sith over."

"So… What's the risky part?" Tyver asked.

"The Sith have started putting adepts onboard every cargo ship. Every single boarding party you guys sent would have to be ready to fight lightsabers." Joseph smirked.

"I've seen some of the garbage these people call 'adept.' It won't be any trouble to train troops to take them down. When you get back to your post, start wiring us those routes and we'll see what we can do about them."

"There's still the matter of somewhere to land after missions." Korbyn interjected. "We need some kind of a headquarters, and this dingy little ship-" Elijah glared at him, but he continued, "is NOT going to do."

"That might not be too hard either. I have a list of unexplored worlds just outside of Sith space, and ever since Narana took over there's not been much interest in checking them out. They should be pretty safe, especially if I blacklist a couple as soon as we claim them." As she finished speaking, Emyrla slipped out of the room and into the cockpit. Elijah followed. Korbyn, realizing the meeting was over, kicked his feet up on the table and twiddled his thumbs as Tyver and Joseph went to their bunks.

* * *

Caelum was a small star system hidden away in the Mid Rim, unnoticed despite being only a few parsecs from the bustling Bothan Space. It was nestled in a very small nebula that no one had really considered relevant enough to merit exploration. The system was discovered and reported by a freelance crew, and was determined to have at least one habitable planet, but was forgotten in the ensuing wars. The Sith knew of it only in the sense that it was toward the bottom of a very long list of planets to explore, and ever since Darth Narana had taken power the list had been unused.

The system itself was fairly unspectacular; two solid planets and six gas giants spun around a practically newborn yellow star. What was spectacular was the space around the system. A small pocket of the nebula, just off the center, had collapsed to form the system, but it was largely intact for a few light-years in every direction, making the sky into a stunning static light show. Glowing orange clouds mixed with sapphires, emeralds and gold lit from the stars inside, practically obscuring the light of the star itself with their brilliance.

One of the solid planets, the further of the two from the star, was covered in liquid water with the exception of three small continents and a few islands, altogether only comprising about a quarter of the planet's surface. The waters were fairly calm—the absence of a moon meant the absence of tides. The small had a pleasant temperature range, and all of these factors together had given birth to sentient life.

This life had developed very quickly. The star was only a few hundred million years old, and the planet was a bit younger than that. In that time, one specific species had evolved all the way to sentience. This species was avian, very similar in stature and appearance to a small falcon. It had gotten the short end of the evolutionary stick, in that regard; these birds had a very difficult time manipulating their environment. The advantage they had, though, was their intellect. These creatures were among the quickest thinking the galaxy had, and had very little in their minds to make them aggressive. While they were by no means completely pacifistic, very few among them had desired violence, so the race had, within a hundred thousand years, already begun to write and build small cities.  
These creatures were the only sentient life that had ever been in the system… until the _Back Burner_ and three large troop transports popped into view above their planet. As the four ships touched down on the largest of the three continents, the sentient birds rushed to investigate the new visitors.

"Wow. This is one hell of a nice planet. I mean… Wow." Emyrla stretched in the warm sun. They had landed on a sunny beach overlooking sparkling blue-green water. White sand softly shifted beneath the feet of the hundreds of men and women exiting the transports. The palm trees nearby were filled with large birds, squawking and chirping excitedly at these strange intruders.

"Hey, captain…" Tyver said to Joseph, without taking his eyes off the trees. "Do these birds seem a bit… fixated?" Joseph looked up from the soil-sampler he was deploying.

"I see what you mean. Someone see if they can't grab one." One of the men tried unsuccessfully to snatch a bird that had ventured to the sand. The rest began a frenzied squawk, dive-bombing him until he retreated to a small group that had gathered to watch.

Elijah stepped off the _Back Burner,_ making his way across the sand to Joseph and Emyrla.

"Hey, Elijah. Catch one of those birds for me." Joseph murmured. Elijah walked toward another bird on the sand, but stopped ten feet away.

"Joseph, this bird is writing something in the sand." The chatter among the hundreds now off their ships stopped immediately. Everyone stared at Elijah and the bird. Elijah looked into the falcon's beady eyes. The falcon stared back. Between them was a small message written in some language known only to the natives. The bird, however, was smart. It realized now that these newcomers couldn't understand it, so it turned and squawked something to one of its comrades in the trees. Another bird dove to the sand bearing a universal peace offering—a small branch with a cluster of berries at the end. Elijah took one and popped it in his mouth. It tasted awful.

* * *

_Time… To wake up._ He couldn't be killed. Not that easily. His own power would never overcome him. He had lost most of it in his fury nineteen years ago… Was it already nineteen years past? Time seemed so short after having been locked away… Locked away for twenty-five thousand years… Conscious… No, he musn't think of these things. There was work to be done. Revenge to be had. He had brought the Infinite Empire to its knees, but in these twenty-five millennia there was sure to be a thriving civilization in the galaxy. A thriving civilization to enslave.

Where was he? He didn't know. He was floating in space. Why wasn't he dead? No matter. Time to go. A hyperspace generator was floating in the wreckage nearby. He willed it to him with the force. He had to make it work. If he could survive the vacuum, he could survive hyperspace. He latched himself onto the generator with his claw-like hands and began to activate it with the force. He started to create a protective bubble around himself, but discovered that one was already enveloping him and the immediate vicinity. Ah. No wonder he'd lived for two decades with no sustenance. No wonder the wreckage was still contained here around him.

The hyperdrive whirred to a start. He gazed to the stars… They were so different than he remembered them. He found Navigas, the bright green star that could be seen throughout most of the galaxy, and looked for other markers. Some had changed in the many years since he had stargazed, but he determined his position. He wasn't far from his home… But was surprisingly far for having been at sublight speeds.

His generator ignited and tore open a hole in space itself. The stars around him turned to harsh white blurs as he spun through hundreds of light-years of empty space. The time passed quickly. With no ship around the hyperdrive, it took much, much longer to reach his destination, but two weeks passed like two seconds, and he had arrived. Lehon. Rakata Prime. The home of his people. The home of…

The Star Forge was gone. How could the Star Forge be gone? He sensed its power still lingering in the area, but the station was nowhere to be seen. He floated himself to the surface of the planet, but the surface was practically bare. Not a single piece of the Star Forge. _Blast_ those pathetic remnants of his race, they couldn't even safeguard their greatest relic!

Their greatest relic… No. Star Forge was not the most powerful thing his civilization had created. _He_ was the most powerful relic of his empire. After twenty-five thousand years, he had no choice but to admit what he was.

"I… I am… Nothing but a relic…" But he must be more than that. He was a living thing. Not a piece of old technology. A living, breathing thing. He had a mind, a heart, a name… What was his name? He searched his memory, but for twenty-five thousand years he'd had no one to tell it to. With all of the things he had learned about the force in his stasis, he had forgotten the very thing that made him unique. He felt the urge to weep… He didn't know his own name! But… No. No matter. None of it mattered—not his name, not his status as a "living thing." He _was_ a relic… And that would be his name, now. That would be what this galaxy would learn to fear.

"I am… Relik…"

* * *

The Ouijan system was a noisy, chaotic place. It had escaped the eyes of almost all of the governments that had controlled it through the ages, and had become quite the haven for the dregs of the galaxy. It was a good place to find the cheapest goods around… Provided one was alright with broken, stolen goods. More importantly, it was a very good place to hide.

The crew of the _Wounded Gazelle _were, but for one, here for just that purpose. The ship itself looked so un-space-worthy it was a wonder it flew at all. A few cables were flung loose from the sides of the ship, sparking occasionally, and the engines appeared to be perpetually burning in places they were most definitely not designed to. Several of the hull panels seemed loosely attached at best, and the two laser cannons lashed to the front didn't appear to actually be hooked up. It all added to the effect of an apparently derelict but in reality very deadly ship.

The _Gazelle_ was under attack. It had left Ouijan II a few hours ago and was pinned just off the planet's fourth moon in several interdiction cones. Four pirate vessels bore down on it, all much larger than the corvette they were preying upon. Two were something akin to old Imperial Strike Cruisers, the other two were limited model ships clearly designed on a budget. All four of them together would almost put up a fight for the _Gazelle._

The sparking cables sprang erect, a few pointing to each of the attacking ships. Streams of electricity erupted from each cable, latching on to the ships as high-tension lines. The ships crunched a bit as they were instantly pulled to a stop. The _Gazelle _locked itself in place with stabilizing thrusters, and but for its own oscillation, enabled by the moving of the physical cables, made it very clear that none of the combatants would be moving anywhere it didn't want them to.

The loose hull panels swiveled on their mounts revealing turbolaser cannon mounts, which opened up on the startled opponents. The rockets, disguised as the laser cannons in the front, fell completely free of the ship and ignited, flashing silently through space and blasting the Strike Cruisers with stunning concussive force. The helpless pirates desperately tried to bring their guns to bear, but could only maneuver enough to use the limited guns on the fronts of their vessels. Those guns harmlessly prodded the _Gazelle's _surprisingly strong shields as the smaller ship tore them to ribbons.

Within minutes, the _Gazelle _shut its stasis generators down and reeled in its guns. It loaded two new "laser cannons" in the front and released a few salvage drones toward what was left of the pirates' ships.

Onboard, the crew of the ship was laughing uncontrollably.

"Sweet space rocks, that _never_ gets old!" An old man sat at the head of a rectangular table, laughing and wheezing. Captain Kerv, as he was known, had spent the better part of fifty years outfitting his ship with costly mechanisms just to fool others into thinking it wasn't one of the deadliest ships, pound for pound, in the galaxy. He'd pulled that gambit an uncountable number of times… Actually, it was very countable. He scratched another four marks into the wide flat wall behind him. It was covered… The gambit had just claimed victims number 343, 344, 345 and 346. As he leaned forward toward the table, a young man with pure white hair came in from the cockpit.

"Sir, salvagers just got back in. Just from what the computer says about the parts we probably cleared almost six million credits. That doesn't account for potential ransoms from the seventeen living crew members we rescued, which I figure will tack another half-million on at least."

"You've got a good head for numbers, Teron. And that's a _damn_ good profit. When we get planetside, drinks are on me." His crew cheered. Four others sat around the table, only one non-human. The blue-skinned twi'lek woman, known to her crew as 'Tails,' sat quietly with her hands in her lap, listening to the rest converse about how they'd be spending their shares. Kerv had stolen her from a wealthy businessman on Muunilinst. She was technically still a slave, but the only place that really showed was in her paycheck, which equaled only about a third of any other crewmember's share. In truth, she wouldn't have been paid much more even if she hadn't been a slave—Kerv was incredibly speciesist—but this life was inarguably better than her life as a conventional slave had been.

Teron, toward the head of the table, had suffered some sort of accident earlier in his life. He wouldn't say what it was or if he even remembered, but it had left him with white hair and a vertical scar across his right eye. He had the look of a man fearing something on his heels, and was starting to show far too much age for being only a year past adulthood. His skills were up to his unreasonable requirements, though—he was a gifted pilot and handy in a fight.

Kerv, himself, was a grizzled veteran of a hundred wars that never happened. He had a sense of honor slightly larger than a planet and more twisted than a spiral nebula, leading to his need to fight "the good fight" even when no one else was shooting. He was, as mentioned before, a speciesist, and had little to no respect for anyone who wasn't purely human. Yet beneath it all was a man who was trying to be, fundamentally, a good person. Of course, given his nature, his many enemies didn't care what kind of person he was _trying_ to be.

Given the system they were in, this crew was very, very normal. Of course, you couldn't convince any of the pirates of that, seeing as they were dead. But the crew of the _Wounded Gazelle _hadn't come to this system to fight pirates. They'd come, like so many others, to lay low, and now any chance of that was gone. With a short stop planetside, they were on their way, setting a course for somewhere they knew they could disappear. Somewhere no one but they had discovered. The ship blinked away, heading toward Bothan space, toward a little nebula with a system called Caelum nestled inside.

* * *

The construction of the base on Caelum was coming along swimmingly. Or, flying-ly, given that the birds, the Cae as they were being called, were now actively helping. They'd caught on to the activity very quickly and seemed eager to welcome Joseph's crew as guests. Several of his employees were trained linguists, and they assured him that though the Cae would never be able to speak basic, and that the humanoids would never be able to squawk like the Cae, they would be able to understand each other within a few weeks.

With a solid planetside fort now under his command, Joseph needed to focus on starships. Right now all he had was a conglomeration of freighters and tiny frigates, mixed in with some stuntfighters. They were going to need capital ships, pickets, and organized fighter squadrons to go toe to toe with the Sith. Expensive would not _begin_ to describe that endeavor.

In front of Joseph now was a large tactical display of the galaxy. Occasionally he would zoom in on a sector, ponder for a moment, then zoom back out. He marked a few spots with holographic beacons, leaving quick verbal notes to label them. The door behind him slid open, admitting Emyrla and Elijah.

"Hey Joseph, I've gotta head back to Kuat before my inferior superiors start wondering where I've been. You know how to reach me." Emyrla waved as she turned on a heel and left. Elijah stepped next to Joseph.

"What're you looking for?" He asked, staring at one of the beacons on the map. Joseph dropped his hand from his chin, eyes lit.

"Not looking for. Found. I've been trying to find good sources of income, mostly through Sith trade routes we could attack, but I just found a gold mine. Follow me." They hurried to the briefing room.

About a half an hour later, a small group of Joseph's most trusted soldiers was assembled in the briefing room. Elijah and Tyver sat behind the holographic projector with Joseph, while Korbyn, three men and two women watched from the other side. The image of a barren, rocky planet shot out from the projector between the two groups.

"This is Tep II. It's a small Sith planet somewhere between Naboo and Sullust. When the Sith Empire began to lose its grip on Naboo, they transferred hundreds of priceless artifacts dating back to before the Galactic Civil War to the vaults beneath this world. When Narana took over, they, like so much of the galaxy's historical artifacts, were largely forgotten. I have fairly recent intel—" One of the two women chipped in.

"How recent is _fairly?_" She didn't back down in the slightest from Joseph's stare.

"As of two months ago. If you'd care to save your questions for the end, Ms. Quell, it would probably save us a lot of time." She sighed and looked back to the hologram.

"Now, where was I? Right. I have recent intel that suggests the vaults on Tep II are only guarded by a single battalion of regular Imperial soldiers. That's about 800 very squishy targets scattered across an area far too large for them to actually maintain effective guard. The planet apparently relies on being unknown to escape attack, but staying unknown doesn't work so well when we have an agent slipping us Imperial star charts." Korbyn spoke up.

"What's in these vaults? Gold? Jewels? Rare and delicious candy?" Joseph smiled as he answered.

"These vaults are holding, primarily, datapads and holocrons from the Clone Wars. They also have quite the store of ancient Nubian artifacts. Our agent estimates the vaults' total worth to be _at least_ three quarters of a billion credits." Someone let out a whistle.

"That's enough to buy a half-dozen capital ships and pay the entire army for a year!" One of the soldiers behind Korbyn, a man named Carver, said. Quell spoke up again.

"How do we liberate all of this crap? Just fly in with our old freighters and start shooting?"

"No." Joseph clicked a button on his remote, and the hologram zoomed in to a row of four large buildings partially sunk into the rock. When he added the garrison units to the display, the scale became more apparent. The vaults were nearly a quarter-mile high.

"These are the main four vaults we're looking to attack. Notice the hangar door on the far-left vault? They keep a very large bulk freighter in that hangar in case they need to evac the vaults. We're going to use it for exactly that purpose. The nine of us slip in, undetected, and clear out the guards inside the vaults, then we bring in a team of salvage droids to load the transport. It'll be a fairly light load, given that it's mostly data."

"What makes this data so valuable?" Elijah asked.

"Some of these datapads are only valuable as historical curiosities. But our agent believes that a few might contain coordinates for abandoned space stations, droid manufacturing plants, or even the locations of force crystal reserves. Any of those would mean a tidy profit. Now, we're going to use the _Back Burner_ as our command ship for this mission. If there are no other questions, we ship out in two hours."

* * *

Delivering bad news was _not_ a healthy job when dealing with Empress Narana. Ensign Balamen, assigned to tell Narana of the two deserters' escape was very new to the Sith military, and even he knew that. He waited until she was on the bridge, hoping her mood would be better than if he interrupted her in her quarters. Unfortunately, she was in a decidedly bad mood as she stomped through the elevator door.

"Captain, take us to Hunrak. That little prick told me my brother was seen on Dantooine. I can't _believe_ I was stupid enough to buy that. Oh, and bring the _Tyranny_ along with us, I want to level that asshole's city." The ensign approached her nervously. She looked at him, and he immediately fancied his neck constricting.

"What do you want? If you're here to ask my permission to attack something, just do it. If you're here for a pay raise, you're dumber than you look." She apparently thought something about what she said was incredibly funny, and giggled a bit. Balamen was torn between using this opportunity to tell her the news quickly or just leaving, and maybe looking back to find out how he'd come to work for such a psychopath. He went with the former, because reflecting on his life always depressed him a little.

"The… The two defected stormtroopers…" He began, but she cut him off.

"The ones from that stupid little planet I destroyed? What about them?"

"They… Well, Admiral Tulam told me to tell you… They…" Narana tapped her foot.

"Spit it the hell out, I have things I could be doing."

"The deserters weren't killed on Silvera, and no one has any idea where they are." He blurted. Narana cocked an eyebrow.

"So find them and kill them. What makes you think I care about two idiots in my galaxy? Right now I'm concerned with one idiot. One really big idiot who told me something very stupid, and who is going to die messily. CAPTAIN! Hunrak! Now!" Balamen knew when to walk away, and was relieved at the chance to leave before Narana started doing something that made even less—or more frighteningly, a bit more—sense.


End file.
